It all came down to years. As I recall, Danny offered two, and Tony wanted three. In hindsight, it seems like an easy decision: Tony as an elite defender, and played very well as a backup SF (a position we later traded our starting center to fill).

However, in Danny's defense:

* Tony was injury prone. At the time, he had missed 28, 36, 7, 49, an 31 games in the previous five seasons. Committing guaranteed money to him for three years was a risk;

* Danny was preserving cap flexibility. Between the pending, then-unknown CBA and a ton of expiring contracts all set to time out at the same time, Danny wanted to preserve the opportunity to make a big free agent splash. Tony's salary could have impacted that.

But he traded for Green instead, meaning a big free agent splash wasn't the most important thing on his mind. Unless he planned on renouncing Green. I personally don't think 3-4 mil in salary is truly crippling to the cap when you get an elite talent in return.

And speaking of hindsight, it's too bad he didn't stick out those two years because he would've made it completely out of Ray's shadow. Rondo, Tony, AND Bradley would be such a devastating rotation. Literally the 3 best backcourt defenders in the league (with Thabo in there somewhere). LeBron/Wade would be in tears, and not even they could do anything with those 3 on the break.

Current rosters/salaries aside, I'd trade Green for Tony straight up and not lose any sleep. Throw their respecting salaries in there and it's a steal.

Green was in his last year so they could have just said "good bye" if they needed that space.

I don't have an issue with losing TA because of what was going on.

The bigger issue was not properly replacing him in that off season.

Right but the year after that when he was hurt, there was all that talk about him still being a part of the team, him being part of our future, him having the potential to become a better defender than Perk. All before Dwight waived his ETO. Obviously that could've been us keeping our options open, and we could've renounced him anyway, but it never sounded like he was just a rental.

Of course they are going to talk him up. Make sure he feels part of the future.

But they kept their flexibility at the time. It worked out that there was not a better option.

Well ya see he could contribute a lot to the Club. Lot's of energy and raw talent. Why would we need that??? It's beginning to look like the Celts don't know talent if it's standing right in front of them. So we go for the likes of Bass who can play well against Washington. Another Jewel, Sully, skip over Terry and maybe Lee and you can include the entire bench whose appreciation will be had when they leave.

Just because we wanted Tony Allen doesnt mean he wanted us. Its not as easy as oh, why didnt you just sign him. Tony wanted a starting role and more security then we could offer. Danny did his part but Tony wanted something else.

I suspect Tony Allen wanted to be treated as starting SG of the future, with it being likely he inherited the role by the end of his contract.

Logged

"The worst thing that ever happened in sports was sports radio, and the internet is sports radio on steroids with lower IQs.” -- Brian Burke, former Toronto Maple Leafs senior adviser, at the 2013 MIT Sloan Sports Analytics Conference

Oh well.... he was the most frustrating player to watch in the entire kg era to me who could play spurts of great d and finally started getting it together before he decided he wanted more minutes elsewhere and has been very good but Danny tried

anyways bradley might not have tony's size but he is a much greater force as a defender for the guard positions

Ha.

Ignoring defensive ability completely, I applaud your assurance that 2-3 good months in a Celtic uniform is capable of lifting a player "much" higher than 8-9 years of defensive dominance.

Based off what they said about him right away and what he showed..I thought it was better then anything Tony "just bit on another pump fake Allen" ever did consistently for us...if hes been dominant it must have been somewhere else

He was great in 20 minutes, anything longer and his limitations started to show. I wouldn't have committed to starter money or minutes to him, but I don't think the money or years were unreasonable at all.

And with Bradley as insurance and KG on the baseline, we would have maintained a pretty clear defensive identity that seems to be quite lacking at present.

I was very glat to watch Tony play, but only for spurts and only on defense.

It all came down to years. As I recall, Danny offered two, and Tony wanted three. In hindsight, it seems like an easy decision: Tony as an elite defender, and played very well as a backup SF (a position we later traded our starting center to fill).

However, in Danny's defense:

* Tony was injury prone. At the time, he had missed 28, 36, 7, 49, an 31 games in the previous five seasons. Committing guaranteed money to him for three years was a risk;

* Danny was preserving cap flexibility. Between the pending, then-unknown CBA and a ton of expiring contracts all set to time out at the same time, Danny wanted to preserve the opportunity to make a big free agent splash. Tony's salary could have impacted that.

But he traded for Green instead, meaning a big free agent splash wasn't the most important thing on his mind. Unless he planned on renouncing Green. I personally don't think 3-4 mil in salary is truly crippling to the cap when you get an elite talent in return.

And speaking of hindsight, it's too bad he didn't stick out those two years because he would've made it completely out of Ray's shadow. Rondo, Tony, AND Bradley would be such a devastating rotation. Literally the 3 best backcourt defenders in the league (with Thabo in there somewhere). LeBron/Wade would be in tears, and not even they could do anything with those 3 on the break.

Current rosters/salaries aside, I'd trade Green for Tony straight up and not lose any sleep. Throw their respecting salaries in there and it's a steal.

Green was in his last year so they could have just said "good bye" if they needed that space.

I don't have an issue with losing TA because of what was going on.

The bigger issue was not properly replacing him in that off season.

Right but the year after that when he was hurt, there was all that talk about him still being a part of the team, him being part of our future, him having the potential to become a better defender than Perk. All before Dwight waived his ETO. Obviously that could've been us keeping our options open, and we could've renounced him anyway, but it never sounded like he was just a rental.

Of course they are going to talk him up. Make sure he feels part of the future.

But they kept their flexibility at the time. It worked out that there was not a better option.

I know, the Celtics played it exactly the way they were supposed to. All I was saying was that it had more to do with Tony's wishes than it did with more money/third year (and we could've raised our offer to similar money over the 2 years).

Also I was guessing that it was Danny's plan all along to bring back KG (thus allowing us to sign Green) rather than renounce KG with no guarantee in that off-season. If he didn't seriously want to add Green (or originally Harden) to our core, he could've just as easily said "good bye" to Perk.

anyways bradley might not have tony's size but he is a much greater force as a defender for the guard positions

Ha.

Ignoring defensive ability completely, I applaud your assurance that 2-3 good months in a Celtic uniform is capable of lifting a player "much" higher than 8-9 years of defensive dominance.

Based off what they said about him right away and what he showed..I thought it was better then anything Tony "just bit on another pump fake Allen" ever did consistently for us...if hes been dominant it must have been somewhere else

thanks, I was going to respond but i think you answered it well enoughby the way bradley's man on d is some of the best I've seen in watching basketball (am i that old) in 30 years of watching nba

Wow. Lose one game by fouling a jump shooter and people will use it as a poster for your defensive abilities the rest of your career.

Good thing all the best defenders (especially Bradley) have never been called for fouls playing overly aggressive defense. Thank God we don't still have "just bit on another pump fake Stiemsma" blocking all those shots.

I tend to agree with the OP that it was terrible decision not to sign him.

Only reason I give a small pass is the injury concern/games played. Just seems odd to sign Daniels year after year and even delonte.

Tony would have tied up money but it was an extremely reasonable deal. I mean Avery Bradley has shown a lot less in his time here, is injury prone and im sure no one would have a problem extended him right now at 3 years/9 mil.

I think people are being completely naive about Allen wanting a bigger role. If the C's made the same offer or a respectable offer in comparison to what he did, he would have signed for the C's.

Did James Posey really sign with the Hornets because he wanted a bigger role? Saying something like that is translation for "They didn't offer me enough"